“But... you’re entirely off the track, dear boy. Karl has been here in the house for the past three hours.”
“Then he must have a twin running around loose gunning for me... As for the other two — I’d lay some odds that one of them was your new butler, Jeeves Mancini, the demon major-domo, who seemed to be sort of lying down on the job when I saw him. The third man,” said the Saint dispassionately, “may very well have been you.”
Spangler’s expression of outraged innocence would have done credit to a cardinal accused of committing bigamy.
“But that’s simply preposterous. I haven’t left the house yet today. As a matter of fact, Karl and Slim and I were about to leave for the gym to meet the Angel when you arrived.” He spread his hands. “Surely you’re not serious when you say you actually expected to find three anonymous snipers — men who tried to shoot you from a car like movie gangsters — here in my house?”
“I don’t say I had that idea all along,” Simon admitted. “It just kind of grew on me when I found their car parked in front of this house. Your Stanley Steamer, I presume, Dr Livingston?”
“What!” Spangler’s eyes were round with appalled amazement, “My dear boy, are you sure you’re not feeling the heat? My car has been parked there all day.”
“I did feel the heat,” said the Saint gently, “of your car’s engine. For a jalopy that hadn’t been moved all day, it was awful feverish.”
“Standing out there in the sun—”
“It might get the chill off. But I hardly think the sun was quite hot enough to burn those holes through the rear window and the windshield.”
Spangler sank back into his chair, shaking his head helplessly.